Ireland's best-known exports are traditionally cattle and stout but we now have a political export rapidly making a name for himself on the European scene.
Like him or loathe him, there is no way Europeans can ignore Charlie McCreevy. He was in the eye of the storm in Strasbourg this week as he presented the revised version of the hugely-controversial services directive.
The current commission is not over-endowed with colourful characters but our former finance minister more than makes up for the quieter souls.
In the tradition of the "Wild Geese", Mr McCreevy may have been banished to the Continent but, like many of those soldiers of fortune, he has flourished in his new environment. His combination of blunt speaking and unabashed free-market economics have propelled him into the headlines. In the parliament this week, however, we saw a kinder, gentler Charlie McCreevy. There is a time for battle and a time for tactical retreat and the Internal Market and Services Commissioner knows the difference. He had soothing words a-plenty for the MEPs who had come up with a compromise version of the directive to allay the fears of many, particularly trade unionists, that Europe was in a dive to the bottom that would leave hard-won wage-levels and employment standards in tatters.
Judging from the way reporters were crowded around him, it was clear that he had caught the imagination of Europeans, although they still seem unsure whether he's a dream come true or the manifestation of a nightmare. An anonymous diplomat insisted that the commissioner was happy to be rid of the original hardline directive, dreamt-up by Dutch predecessor Frits Bolkestein. But he might yet get his own back on detractors because, according to Industry Commissioner Gunther Verheugen of Germany, you never knew what was going on inside the head of Charlie McCreevy - or any Irish person, apparently.